My wife and I are visiting this weekend with our Philadelphia daughter. The occasion is the fitting for her wedding dress. I was asked yesterday if I would lead her down the aisle. You might be thinking "naturally", but I am not her biological father. Her biological father tries to remain in her life but often fails in his efforts. He's not a bad man and if I knew him in any other context, such as being a next-door neighbor, I'd think he was a great guy. His flaw is that if you look up the word cheapskate in the dictionary, his picture is there. Daughter learned from him a while back that he was not inclined to contribute to the cost of the upcoming wedding with the rationalization that parents don't pay for weddings after the point in time that a daughter graduates from college. He contributed nothing, of course, to the cost of her education. So I answered right away that I would feel honored to see her under the canopy.

We all fear that this might lead to drama on the wedding day but I intend to head this off by having a little talk with biological dad ahead of time. That way if he feels like punching me in the nose, he can get it out of his system before the day.